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“Are you sure about this?” Nat asks Bucky, as both of them watch the security monitor. It displays the live feed from a holding cell three floors below them, in the subterranean levels of SHIELD HQ.
On the screen, a large man sits perfectly immobile behind the electrified bars of the cell. His dark blond hair is slicked back, and a short beard roughs up the austere lines of his face. There’s a large scrape on his forehead from where Bucky had hit him with the shield. He’s wearing an olive drab t-shirt under a bulletproof vest. The Hydra logo emblazoned on the left sleeve of his t-shirt leaves no doubt where his allegiance lies. His entire left arm appears to be made of metal. His hands are handcuffed and a short chain attaches the cuffs to leg fetters that are bolted to the floor. He stares into the middle distance with eyes that don’t seem to take in anything around him.
It’s all a calculated lie. Bucky has seen him fight. The man misses nothing.
“It’s him, Nat.”
“He may look like Steve, but that’s not Steve.” Distress mars her calm, professional mask, a sign of how shaken she is. “You saw how many men he killed, the way he did it. That’s not Steve.”
Bucky knows what she means. The man in the cell was merciless and ruthless, and he killed with such brutal grace that Bucky hadn’t been able to look away. Strip Steve of his higher ideals, and that’s how he’d fight; smart, efficient, lethal; leaving dead bodies in his wake, instead of just broken bones and contusions.
So the question is, what had Hydra done to Steve, and who did Bucky have to kill in recompense.
The door opens behind them, and they both turn to look as Sam walks in with a file in his hands. From the look on Sam’s face, Bucky knows he’s right, and a part of him can’t help but feel relieved because it meant that Steve was alive. “It’s him, isn’t it,” Bucky says.
Sam’s voice is strained when he answers. “Fingerprints match. Ear prints match. No one dared get close enough to run a retinal scan.” Sam passes the file to Bucky. “DNA testing should be ready by this evening. But near as we can tell, it’s him.”
They all turn back towards the security monitor and stare at Captain Steve Rogers, decorated war hero and former leader of their five-person anti-terrorist squad. “I’m going in there,” Bucky says.
Nat turns disbelieving eyes on him, but Sam is less restrained. “Are you fucking crazy, man? He was gunning for you! He was literally climbing over people to get at you, and you wanna go in there with him?”
“He saved my life, Sam.” And he’d done it at the cost of his own. Even after four years, not one week goes by that Bucky doesn’t wake from nightmares of watching Steve fall out the side of a moving train. So to find out that Steve didn’t die, but had been taken by Hydra instead, the organization that Steve had dedicated his life to eradicating, and turned into their tool… There is nothing Bucky wouldn’t do to bring Steve back from that.
“I have to do this.” He meets both their eyes. “Watch my back.”
“Fuck you, Barnes!” Sam shouts, as Bucky walks out the door. “At least wait for Stark to look at the scans of that arm. He might have a fucking rocket launcher hidden in there!”
Bucky carries on walking. He knows Sam and Nat will be there. He can already hear them scrambling for backup.
๑ ๑ ๑
The trip down takes too long and not long enough and then he’s standing before the doorway that leads to the holding cell, heart pounding like he’d run all the way instead of taking the escalator. He takes a deep breath and relives the moment when the world had gone quiet around him as he’d stared into familiar eyes, still the same piercing blue he dreamed about, but as cold and flat as arctic ice. He’d been so dumbstruck at seeing Steve alive that he hadn’t paid any attention to the gun that was pointed at him. If Sam hadn’t charged in at the last moment and shoved Bucky out of the way, he’d be laid out on a metal table somewhere in the building, with a bullet hole between his eyes courtesy of Steve.
The moment he steps into the room, Steve focuses on him like a targeting system acquiring a lock. Not even the metal bars separating them can mute the feral intensity in Steve’s eyes. “Do you have a name?” Bucky asks.
No answer.
“Well, I’m Bucky. Can I call you Steve?”
No answer.
Bucky moves over to the keypad and starts keying in the access code to unlock the cell door. “I’m coming in.” He can hear the sound of booted feet in the corridor outside the holding cell, and he’s sure Steve can, too, but Steve’s focus on him never wavers. Not many people realized how intense Steve was underneath his aw-shucks charm, but then, not many people had seen how Steve could get during sex, the way he looked at Bucky like he wanted to consume him. If there was one thing guaranteed to light Bucky up, it was that look, and since the way Steve looks at him now is not all that dissimilar, it’s giving his body a lot of conflicting impulses.
There’s a beep when his code is accepted, and then the cell door slides back on its track. Keeping his breathing even so he doesn’t betray his nerves, he steps inside the cell under Steve’s unwavering gaze, nothing separating them except the titanium-reinforced restraints keeping Steve in his chair. Steve shouldn’t be able to break the restraints, even with the metal arm. If he does break free, Bucky’s confident Nat, Sam, and the team they’ve assembled can stop him—they did it once before, after all. They’ve all also been issued tasers and tranq guns, because no one wants to be responsible for killing the former Captain America.
“I guess… I’ll just talk,” Bucky says. “You always did say I could talk enough for the two of us.” He doesn’t know what to do with his hands, so he stands at parade rest. “Your name is Steve Rogers. Your mom’s name is Sarah Rogers. You and me? We’ve been best friends since we were kids, practically grew up in each other’s houses. You d—I thought you died saving my life, Steve. Do you—” his voice cracks. “Do you remember any of this?” he finishes on a whisper. He swallows convulsively and looks down. So much for not giving away his feelings.
There’s a squeak and clink and Bucky looks up just in time to see Steve exploding out of his seat and launching himself at Bucky.
“Fuck!” Bucky hardly has time to get his arm up to block the punch being thrown at him. Steve attacks, hitting harder and moving faster than humanly possible, too fast for Bucky to counter. Before Bucky has time to disengage, Steve grabs him by the throat, and shoves him up against the bars of the cell.
From somewhere behind him, Sam shouts, “Let him go! We’ll shoot!” From the corner of his eye, Bucky spots Nat sliding off to the side, trying to get a good angle on Steve with her gun.
“Steve,” Bucky chokes out. He doesn’t try to fight as Steve raises his metal arm, hand curled into a fist. When he looks into cold, blue eyes, empty of all emotion, he can feel his heart breaking apart in his chest. He won’t survive a strike from that arm, not with how strong Steve is now. “Steve,” he tries again.
There’s a flicker of… something in Steve’s eyes. The metal plates of Steve’s arm shift with a metallic whine and Steve’s shoulder drops a fraction. Stupid, foolish hope uncurls in Bucky’s chest at that tiny hesitation. Before he can say something, anything, to try to get through to Steve, he hears a succession of soft hissing sounds to his left, then Steve’s neck sprouts several tranquilizer darts. He glares at Bucky with betrayed rage, then his grip on Bucky’s neck loosens.
Bucky shoves him back with all his might and scrambles out the cell door. Someone slams it shut behind him. When he turns around, Steve’s already on the ground, still glaring at him, then his eyes glaze over and he passes out.
๑ ๑ ๑
Bucky's ears are still ringing from the reaming he got from Fury as he walks to the long-term holding cell that Steve's been transferred to. How the fuck was he supposed to know that Steve would suddenly pull heretofore unknown super strength out of his ass and go on the attack? Those restraints were made to withstand the strength of five men, for fuck’s sake.
What he’s more worried about is just what the hell Hydra had done to Steve to turn him into some kind of killing machine. He’s sure Steve fought them as hard as he could, and trying to imagine that fight tears at him. Just as he’s sure that Hydra hadn’t fully succeeded. Because Bucky should’ve been dead—Steve had more than enough time to kill him—but here he was.
His steps slow as he reaches the doorway at the end of the corridor. Beyond it is the room holding Steve’s cell. It’s large and rectangle-shaped, and partitioned into two parts by electrified metal bars; a larger area that serves as the holding cell, and a smaller viewing area. He forces himself forward, walking as though his body isn’t one huge bruise.
As soon as he steps into the room, he sees Steve sitting cross-legged on the mattress on the floor, watching him with cold eyes. It's eerie how blank Steve's stare is, when his eyes used to snap with an internal fire, full of the life and zeal that blazed through him. Try as he might to convince himself that Steve was still in there, a chill still runs through him when Steve's gaze pauses on the visible bruises on his neck, like a predator cataloging weakness. He tries not to think about the way his throat aches when he swallows.
Steve wears standard SHIELD-issue gray sweatpants and black t-shirt. His feet are bare. Everything was calibrated to make him feel vulnerable, like an oyster shucked from its shell. Looking at Steve now, all hard edges, cold gleam of the metal arm, Bucky thinks not even being stark naked would make him look vulnerable.
“You'll be staying here for a while,” Bucky says. He takes a careful seat in the plastic chair facing the bars, and rests the sketchbook he’s holding on his lap. “I didn’t get to introduce myself properly before you attacked me,” he says dryly. “James Buchanan Barnes. You called me Bucky.” Among other things.
“So super strength,” he continues. “That was quite a surprise. You hid that really well when we took you down the first time. Why is that?” Getting Stark to vet the scans of the arm just got booted up to top priority now that they suspect Steve let himself be captured. Steve, of course, doesn't say anything. “Yeah, didn't think you'd answer.”
He looks down at the sketchbook in his hands. “I have something of yours. You liked to draw. You were really good at it too.”
Is it strange that he's talking about Steve in the past tense to Steve? He doesn't know how else to phrase things though, because the Steve in front of him seems so alien. He gets up and approaches the cell, watching Steve for any sign of movement, wary of how fast Steve can move now. He goes only close enough to toss the sketchbook through the bars before moving back to the chair.
He tamps down his disappointment when Steve doesn't even look at it, just continues watching Bucky. The sketchbook is one that Steve used when he was at HQ, and it’s filled with sketches of the team joking around in the mess hall, suiting up for a mission, scenery of places they'd been. There are other sketchbooks filled with his private sketches of Bucky, but those Bucky keeps in their apartment. Or well… his apartment now, at least for the last four years.
He pulls out his phone when it buzzes in his pocket. It's a message from Maria: Debrief. He swallows a sigh and puts it away. “I've got to go now. But if you want to speak to me, just call my name. Someone will get the message to me, and I'll come as soon as I can.” He waits a moment for some sign, anything… nothing.
“I'll see you around, Steve.”
When he looks back into the cell one last time before he steps through the doorway, the sketchbook is still lying exactly where it had landed.
๑ ๑ ๑
What follows is a week of Bucky visiting Steve at every available moment. He talks till his throat is hoarse, trying to bring Steve back to himself, but nothing seems to work. Not photos of Sarah. Not photos of the two of them from childhood to adulthood, all carefully curated to remove any hint of their true relationship. Sam and Nat had gone to talk to Steve—he didn’t even look up when they entered. Bucky was so desperate that he even took that as a sign of hope. Sure, he knows on an intellectual level that Steve’s probably fixated on him because he’s Steve’s primary target, but his heart rarely listens to his head.
The really fucked up thing, though, is that the last few times he’d jerked off in the shower, his mind had supplied him with images of Steve watching him, intent and focused, and he’d come so hard he’d nearly bitten through his lip.
No amount of questioning has gotten any answers out of Steve. No one has heard him speak. Not even Nat, SHIELD’s best interrogator, had been able to get so much as a reaction from Steve. Bucky’s glad no one has even hinted at using enhanced interrogation techniques, because he’d really hate to have to shoot a colleague. But looking at the scars on Steve’s body, Bucky’s pretty sure they’d break before Steve did.
On the second week, the team are called away to deal with a terrorist attack which leaves them holed up in a small town in the ass-end of nowhere. It’s five days before Bucky limps back down the corridor leading to Steve’s cell. He’s walking past the control room when Cameron sticks his head out the door. Bucky’s glad Hill assigned Cameron to watch over Steve; he’s one of the SHIELD agents who still remain loyal to Steve, and still call him ‘Captain’.
“You’re back,” Cameron says. Bucky’s eyebrows rise at the unusual level of relief in Cameron’s voice. “Maybe the Captain can get some sleep now,” Cameron continues.
“Steve hasn’t slept?” He follows Cameron behind the monitors showing the surveillance feed from Steve’s holding cell. Even on the black and white feed, he can see shadows under Steve’s eyes. He looks thinner, too, his cheeks appearing sunken, cheekbones standing out prominently.
“No, sir. Not since you left.”
“He hasn’t slept in five days.”
“No, sir. None of us on shift ever saw him sleep. He hasn’t been eating much, as well.”
Bucky turns around and limps as fast as he can towards Steve, barely even taking the time to nod his thanks to Cameron. Steve’s already watching the doorway when Bucky steps through, like he could recognize the sound of Bucky’s footsteps, like he was waiting for Bucky. Steve studies him from where he’s sitting on his mattress with his back resting against the wall. Steve’s gaze settles on the cuts and bruises on Bucky’s face before dropping down to his leg, which would’ve been in a brace if he hadn’t been in such a hurry to get to Steve.
“Did you miss me?” Bucky says as he limps towards the chair and sits down with a relieved sigh. It’s been upgraded to a more comfortable computer chair since he’s started spending most of his time in front of Steve’s cell. He probably has Cameron to thank for that. “Heard you haven’t been sleeping, Steve.”
Steve’s lashes dip as he almost blinks before his gaze steadies again. “It’s your turn to sleep,” Bucky says. “I’ll keep watch.” He’s not ashamed of the way his voice catches on that familiar phrase, something they’d said to each other so many nights over so many missions.
Steve’s focus sharpens on him, then he tips his head back to rest on the wall, and closes his eyes. Bucky’s heartbeat is a thunderous drumbeat in his ears. First chance he gets, he’s getting a cot set up for himself next to the chair. If this is the closest he can get to Steve, then so be it.
๑ ๑ ๑
Bucky jerks awake when alarms start blaring. His eyes immediately go to Steve, who’s already standing in the middle of his cell and watching Bucky, eyes glimmering in the dim light of the room. Bucky rips back the blanket and swings his legs out of the cot while he reaches for his earpiece. He sticks it in and switches it on.
“—dra. I repeat, Hydra has infiltrated the building. We make five ten-men squads spread out inside the building and they’re heading for the lower levels. Barnes, if you hear this, we’re sending you reinforcements. In the meantime, you secure Rogers. And if he tries anything funny, shoot him.” Hill’s voice comes through, stern and focused. His gaze flicks to Steve. Hydra was finally making their move after six weeks of silence. “Copy,” he says.
In the distance, he can hear sounds of gunfire and the occasional scream. He should be out there, helping, not waiting for the fight to come to him. Which should be funny since he’s a trained sniper. But he hasn’t been a sniper in years, not since Fury had convinced him to take over the uniform. Fury had known just what button to push to get him to agree, that fucker. Just one phrase, ‘honor his memory’, and it was game over. Steve had died saving him, so he was going to make Steve’s sacrifice count, or die trying.
He walks over to the locker that’s been slowly filling up with his stuff, and pulls out the stealth suit. With a careful glance at Steve, he strips out of his clothes and squeezes himself into the suit, and then into his combat boots. He pulls on his sidearm and the shield harness, then he takes the shield out and slings it onto his back. When he turns around, Steve has moved right up to the bars and is watching him with a cold gleam in his eyes.
“Let me out,” Steve says, in a voice like gravel. “I can help.”
Bucky’s breath catches at hearing Steve speak for the first time since his capture. “Why should I trust you?” Bucky forces out through a throat tight with emotion.
“Barnes! Do not let him out of the cell. Hydra is here for him.”
“I don’t want them to get me anymore than you do,” Steve answers flatly. “All they do is make me kill.”
“If you want to help me, you’re gonna have to do some killing, pal.”
Steve’s lips curl into a cold, sharp smile. “Killing Hydra is different. Pal.”
“Barnes, don’t listen to him,” Hill says. “How do you think Hydra found us. There’s a transponder in his arm.”
“And you never thought to share this information, Hill? You’re spending too much time with Fury.”
“I’m doing my job,” Hill says tersely. “We wanted to see how important he is to Hydra. And from the number of people they sent, the answer is: Very.”
“How about how important he is to me, Maria.”
“You’re compromised, Barnes. Don’t make this personal,” Hill says. “Do. Your. Job.”
He grits his teeth and swallows back angry words. Hill’s right and he knows it. Fury’s and her priorities remain fixed on stopping Hydra, while his… as soon as Steve dropped back into his life, his priorities had shifted, and it was getting in the way of doing his job. But in this instance, his gut is telling him that to do his job, he should trust Steve.
“Copy,” he says to Hill. “And as the ranking officer in the field, I’m making the call.” He ignores Hill as he steps over to the keypad mounted on the wall and keys in his authorization code. There’s a whirring clank and then the cell door slides back on its track. Bucky releases the safety on his gun and waits to see what walks out.
What walks out is a soldier.
“I need equipment if I’m to be effective,” Steve says.
Bucky releases a pent up breath. He nods at the locker without taking his eyes off Steve. “Help yourself.”
Once Steve changes into tac pants, combat boots, and a bulletproof vest, he turns back to Bucky. “What do you need me to do.”
“You take point,” Bucky says, because gut feeling or no, he’s not quite ready to have Steve at his back. “Let’s not stay here like sitting ducks.”
Steve nods and walks out the door. The corridor is deserted, at least until they get to the surveillance room. When Bucky sticks his head in, Cameron’s head pops up over the bank of monitors, eyes wide at the sight of Steve standing next to Bucky.
“You’re with us,” Bucky says.
“Yes, sir,” Cameron responds smartly. He unholsters his sidearm and falls in behind them as they continue along the corridor.
Steve halts and cocks his head. “Incoming.”
Bucky looks around in surprise. He didn’t hear anything, but maybe Steve’s hearing had also been boosted by whatever Hydra did to give him the super strength. The three of them take up defensive positions in the doorways that line the corridor. A minute later, men dressed in black tac gear and carrying M4 assault rifles spill silently out of the fire escape. Before Bucky can signal Cameron to open fire, Steve steps out of his doorway and walks out to meet the Hydra soldiers.
Fuck. Did he miscalculate? Cameron looks at him with wide, scared eyes. A few more moments, he thinks, he’ll give Steve the benefit of the doubt for a few more moments. They’re so badly outnumbered, it won’t make much difference even if Steve is helping Hydra.
“Winter Soldier,” one of the men says. “Where is your target.”
Steve continues walking towards them. “Not on this level.”
“How did you get out of your c—” The man’s words are cut off when Steve leaps forward, rips the M4 out of his hands, and smashes the butt into the man’s face with a wet-sounding crunch. The man drops like a stone, face crumpled inward like a smashed watermelon. Before the other Hydra soldiers can react, Bucky and Cameron open fire. Steve dives to the side and comes up on his knees with the M4, firing at the second wave of soldiers coming out of the fire escape. In less than two minutes, all the Hydra soldiers lie dead or dying.
“Barnes! What the hell is going on?”
Bucky does a headcount. “Two teams down.”
There’s a moment of surprised silence from Hill, but then she’s back on the ball. “There’s another team on Level 1. They’ve got Carter and her people pinned down. If you’re mobile, go help.”
“Yes, ma’am. And… I’m sorry about what I said earlier.”
“You owe me a beer when all this is through.”
“I will buy you all the beers, Hill.”
They’re halfway to Sharon’s position when two Hydra stragglers burst out from the stairwell behind them and open fire. Cameron screams and goes down as blood blossoms on his right shoulder.
“Fuck!” Bucky dives forward to cover Cameron with the shield knowing he’s left himself wide open. He flinches as a bullet ricochets of something right next to his head with a metallic ping.
When he turns to look, he sees Steve’s metal hand. Steve. Steve blocked a fucking bullet with his metal hand. Steve just saved his life. That’s twice now. Their eyes meet for a brief moment, too brief for Bucky to read the look in Steve’s eyes.
Later, he thinks, later he's going to pin Steve down for a talk. He drags Cameron further behind the cover of the shield as Steve takes out the soldiers with efficient head shots. That used to be Bucky’s calling card, now, it looks like it’s Steve’s as well.
“You okay, Cameron?” Bucky asks as he checks the wound. It looks like a through and through, but they have nothing to staunch the bleeding.
“Yeah, yeah…” Cameron says, voice shaky. “I can walk.”
“I can carry him,” Steve says from behind them. “I’m stronger.”
Cameron turns wide eyes on Bucky. “He doesn’t mean bridal carry, right?”
Bucky can’t help himself, he starts to laugh, partly from picturing a nervous Cameron in Steve’s arms, and partly from relief. “Nah. I’m sure he wants his shooting arm free.” He gets an arm around Cameron and helps him to his feet. Cameron’s clammy with cold sweat, starting to slip into shock, which probably explains his odd question. Bucky is never going to let him live it down. “Let’s get you to Sharon. There’s a first-aid kit in the control room.”
Steve steps in and takes over helping Cameron to walk. He holds the M4 one-handed and pointed forward without any sign of strain as they make their way towards the control room. It doesn’t take Bucky and Steve long to pick off the Hydra soldiers from behind, and then they’re in the control room with Sharon.
Once Cameron has been seen to, Bucky gets clearance from Hill to hunt down the remaining Hydra soldiers in the building. He looks at Steve. “You with me?”
There’s a hungry light in Steve’s eyes when he nods.
This time, Bucky goes out the door first, shield on his left arm, and gun in his right hand, while Steve falls in next to him, rifle up and ready. A fierce flame burns in Bucky’s heart at getting to fight side by side with Steve again.
๑ ๑ ๑
Bucky stabs at the keypad to unlock the cell door. He steps inside, slams the door shut and glares into the security camera. “Lock it.” There’s a whir and a clank and the lock engages. He turns around to face Steve, who’d stood up as soon as he entered.
“This is fucked up, Steve.” He turns back to the camera. “Fucked up, Fury! You hear me?”
“He hears you, man.” Sam’s resignation and amusement come through loud and clear over the earpiece. “I think the whole fucking floor heard you.”
“That’s because it’s fucked up. Steve saved a lot of lives today, including mine. And they’re still locking him up in the cell?”
“He’s got you in it now,” Nat says, “so it’s a step up.”
“He should be coming home with me, is what.”
“We’re working on it, Barnes,” Hill says.
“Yeah… well. It’s still fucked up.” Why do they all have to be so reasonable? The fuckers. “I’m switching off comms now.” He taps the earpiece, takes it out of his ear, and pockets it. He takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly, and looks at Steve. “I’m sorry. You shouldn’t still be in here.”
“I should be going home with you?”
For the first time since Steve had come back, Bucky sees something like softness in Steve’s gaze. His breath catches. “I—No, I mean, only if you want to.” He swallows. “We used to… share an apartment.”
“All those days you spent telling me about my life,” Steve says, an odd light coming into his eyes, “why did you never mention that we were lovers?”
Bucky’s breaths come too fast as his heart lurches in his chest, like it’d just been kicked awake. “You remember that?”
“I remember everything about you.”
He’s already halfway to Steve when he hears a hesitant voice over the intercom. “Sir? Agent Hill asked me to inform you that we will be switching off video surveillance, but audio surveillance will continue for security reasons. She, ah, she said if you scream loud enough, we’ll hear you.”
“Jesus.” He breathes out a laugh. “Thank you, agent.” There’s a click, signaling the intercom mic being switched off.
He looks at Steve with a sheepish smile. “I guess we should keep it down.” Steve watches him, face expressionless, eyes wary, but still holding a flicker of warmth. “You remember everything about me, huh.”
Steve nods.
“How long, Steve.”
“When you came back from your mission, and I slept while you kept watch, I… dreamed. The memories started coming back after that.”
Bucky’s feet move forward of their own accord. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t know how.” Something like guilt or shame flashes in Steve’s eyes before he looks away.
That’s when he notices how Steve’s holding himself as Bucky gets closer—every muscle taut, weight on the balls of his feet, like he’s readying himself for a fight. Bucky immediately backs up, and tries to hide his instinctive hurt at the way Steve relaxes.
He mustn’t have done a good job of it, or maybe Steve can still read him as well as he used to, because Steve’s eyes are sad and knowing when he says, “I’m not the person you remember.”
Fuck Hydra, Bucky thinks, fuck everything they did to Steve. His priorities have pretty much narrowed down to two things; helping Steve find happiness again—even if that means giving him all the space he needs, and burning Hydra to the ground, in that order.
“You saved my life, Steve,” he says. “You’re the person I remember.”
Epilogue
Soft morning light filters through the curtain as Bucky lies on his side and watches Steve sleep. It’s a rare morning when he wakes first, so he doesn't want to waste the opportunity. In sleep, Steve’s face is relaxed and open, vulnerable like it rarely is anymore. He breathes in the scent of them mingled together on their bed and holds tight to it, like the miracle that is.
He remembers the morning a few days after Steve’s memorial service, when he’d woken up and realized that scent had started fading from their bed, that he was losing the last trace of Steve’s presence in their home. He’d curled up in the center of their bed and cried like he hadn’t let himself cry before, in great heaving sobs that left his throat ragged and raw.
And now… and now…
And now he has Steve back. Sure, there are combat boots unlaced and ready by the bed for Steve to jam his feet into in case anyone attacks at night. There’s a gun in the bedside drawer and Bucky’s not sure how many knives stashed all over the apartment and he will probably spend the rest of his life not being allowed to sleep with his back to any door. But he has Steve back. And though Steve may seem different now, quieter, more ruthless, a difference matched outwardly by the beard he still keeps which makes him look harder and older; underneath, he’s still the Steve that Bucky’s loved all his life.
He resists the urge to trace the curve of one perfect, shell-like ear with his finger, not wanting to disturb Steve’s sleep. Then he notices the slight lift to the corner of Steve’s mouth.
“Enjoying the view?” Steve rasps.
“One hundred percent.” No need to resist now that Steve’s up, he decides, and reaches out with his finger. Steve’s smile widens and he turns to look at Bucky, eyes aglow with a quiet happiness that makes Bucky lose his train of thought. “Hey, gorgeous,” Bucky says, not caring that he sounds like a dope.
“Hey, yourself.” And then Steve’s rolled on top of him before he can even blink. Even after nearly a year, Steve’s strength and speed can still catch him off guard. He’s not ashamed to admit that he finds it insanely hot, especially when Steve gets that feral look in his eyes, focused wholly on him. He’d finally told Steve about the times he’d jerked off in the shower thinking of the way Steve watched him through the cell bars. Instead of teasing, Steve's gaze had darkened, and he'd asked Bucky to jerk off in a voice about an octave lower than usual. And holy hell, the memory of that still makes Bucky’s gut clench with want, so maybe he’s a little overenthusiastic when he returns Steve’s good morning kiss.
Steve hums a quiet approval and licks into his mouth. Then he pulls back, lips turned down with disappointment, when the alarm clock starts beeping.
“Fucking early morning meetings,” Bucky groans. “Let’s play hooky.”
Steve says, “You're not setting a good example, Captain America.”
“Hey.” He pokes Steve in the chest. “We’ve been through this. I’m only keeping the suit warm for you, Steve.”
“It’s yours, Buck,” Steve says, a finality in his voice that tells Bucky this wasn't a spur of the moment answer. “Just as the title is.”
Bucky blinks up at Steve in surprise. Up till that moment, Steve had never answered one way or another about taking back the suit and shield and leading the team again.
Steve reaches out a finger and strokes Bucky's temple. “Don't look at me like that.” There are shadows in Steve’s eyes and a quiet appeal for understanding in his voice. “I may have been the right person for the job once, but not any more. That person is you, now. My place is where I can watch your back.”
“Steve…”
“Bucky. If I have to do a PR event, I’ll probably shoot someone.”
Bucky swallows back all his protests. That… might actually happen. And if he could save Steve from being back in the public eye after everything he'd gone through, he would. “Does that mean I outrank you now?”
“You can think that if it makes you happy.”
“What makes me happy is having you back, you giant asshole.”
Steve ducks his head and smiles, then he slides down and rests his head on Bucky’s chest. Bucky doesn't expect him to answer, but then he surprises Bucky by turning his head and whispering into the skin over Bucky’s heart, “I missed you, you know. Even when I couldn’t remember you, I missed you.”
Bucky swallows past the lump in his throat as he wraps his arms around Steve. “I missed you, too.”
They lie together in the little space they’ve carved out for themselves and let the alarm go to snooze.